


Three Things

by ledunks (ficpants)



Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-14
Updated: 2015-02-14
Packaged: 2018-03-12 08:46:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3350564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ficpants/pseuds/ledunks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are three conventional truths that Charlie White knows to be wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Things

**Author's Note:**

> So...this is a semi-angsty piece I wrote in dedication to some very nice people on Tumblr with whom I've had great late night chats with. I don't really know how to explain this except that everyone should read it and interpret it how they want.

_“We need to talk."_

 

**1\. They say you should never settle, but they’re wrong.**

It’s a week before his wedding, and his mom can’t even get through the day without shedding a few tears of both happiness and sadness. “My baby is all grown up,” she says to him as his sisters giggle in the corner and his brother rolls his eyes.

He looks over the RSVP list again at the mix of family, regular friends, and skating friends, and imagines the rest of his life with her.

He knows it’s going to be a happy one, not because love is always easy but because of their willingness to weather the hard times together. They’ve already gone through so much; they’ve already built a life together. You don’t throw that away just because you’re also in love with someone else.

Here’s the reality about love: It’s passion. It’s sacrifice. It’s knowing that you care about someone with such intensity that it surprises you. It’s wanting to know them, be inside them, feel them desperately until the end of time. It’s craving every part of them, it’s needing their essence. It’s when a smile can turn your world upside down and a kiss can ignite it.

And here’s the reality about marriage: It’s a marathon, not a sprint. It’s not for everyone, but ideally the thought is that you don’t go into marriage thinking there’s going to be a second one. When you marry someone, you’ve stopped following your heart because you’ve found a home. You’ve found comfort.

He knows he will be happy. He  _is_ happy. He suppresses the thought that there’s a possibility that he could be happier.

 

**2\. They say there’s nothing worse than marrying the wrong person, but there is.**

Scenario A: He confesses his love and their worlds are turned upside down. They endure the media scrutiny, the painful division of assets, the accusing looks, the awkwardness. Their love triumphs, they marry, and they grow old together.

Scenario B: He confesses their love and the shit hits the fan. They weather it all but in the end they can’t make it work. They separate, as couples do, but they can never really separate as couples do. Every future performance is agony.

Scenario C: He confesses his love, they weather the aftermath, but discover that they are incompatible. Given the drama of what’s happened, they feel obligated to stay together for a while, which only exacerbates their situation. They grow resentful of each other. Their performances are forced and painful.

Scenario D: He confesses his love. She doesn’t feel the same way. He’s quite certain that she does feel the same way, but there’s a difference between maybe and definitely.

He’s run every possible scenario and more in his head millions of times. For every Shen and Zhao there’s at least ten examples of pairs that have hit it and then quit it. He knows their parents have downplayed any romantic aspirations for this very reason. They have certainly been aware that any romantic aspirations would be unwise to their partnership. Before in his mind, his feelings for her and his partnership with her were two separate things. But in the last year that had all changed.

Skating is his life. He can’t imagine ever abandoning it for good. He also can’t imagine ever skating by himself, which meant that his relationship with her had to be preserved at any cost. He doesn’t care that he’s making the safe choice. All he knows is that the longest and most important relationship in his life is still safe and sound. That when he skates out to center ice, she will take his hand and still look at him like he’s all she’ll ever need. That she still smiles with the same patience and purity that she always does.

He loves her, but he knows that he also loves another. So it’s not wrong that at the end of the aisle is a tall(ish) blonde instead of a petite brunette. Because he’s not deceiving anyone, he’s not breaking hearts. They’ve all had to make sacrifices, and he’s 100% into the life they’ve built over the years.

It takes courage to lay it all on the table, and maybe love is about taking risks but when the stakes are so high, is it worth it? Most people would say yes. But he knows that there is more than broken hearts on the line. Some things aren’t worth risking. So maybe sometimes he has to push her away, create distance, so that it’s not as hard in the long run. So maybe it’s okay to be a coward, so long as he can still skate with her.

 

**3\. They say that you only get one great love in life, but they’re wrong.**

He thinks about their first date, how his heart almost fell out of his chest when they kissed. How he felt so ridiculously happy floating on air. How sometimes as he skated by himself he would imagine her sparkling green eyes and her smile that could light up a room. He knew the second he kissed her that he could spend a lifetime with her, and he still thinks that every day he wakes as he holds her in his arms.

But he can also remember the first day he realized he had fallen hopelessly and irretrievably in love with his partner. It was two weeks after Nationals and their opening Scheherazade lift had stopped working. In frustration, she had lashed out at him for the first time in a long time. “It’s not that hard,” she had huffed, crossing her arms and glaring at him in frustration. “It’s just physics!”

Her hair was a mess, there was a coffee stain on her shirt, she was yelling at him, and he realized that he didn’t mind at all. That he found her beautiful in that moment regardless. That he could wake up every day with her yelling at him and he would still want to be with her. And it clicked in that moment that no matter what, he was always going to love this girl.

Even after all these years, she still takes his breath away and it’s not just because of his asthma. As they grow older and the length between performances grows, his feelings don’t change. He thinks that she feels the same way. Their touches linger more. When they’re alone together every gaze, every movement, every word is charged with a lingering energy. She presses against him at an airport once by accident and he almost loses it as she turns bright red and flustered, nervously twisting at her own new diamond engagement ring. Nothing ever happens, but he can still always feel the possibility.

This is his normal: He’s happily married, but he also loves her. He loves her, but he’s also happily married to someone else. He can’t compare the two, and he can’t imagine being without either. What kind of person does that make him? It’s not fair, it eats at him constantly, but love is love. “What if” is a daily torture. He made his choice a long time ago, and there’s no looking back. But what if they could make a new normal?

He’s lucky to have two loves in his life. He’s cursed in that both loves run concurrent.

 

_“Charlie?”_

_He took a deep breath and smiled. “I love you.”_


End file.
